Chelsea

Sometimes I wonder if life is long enough, because there are so many dreams in my heart and I desire to see them all come to fruition.

Right now I’m living one of my dreams!

2 months ago, I picked up my life and moved to a city where I knew almost no one and began building a life in Washington D.C. The journey hasn’t been what I expected it to be, it’s been harder than I ever imaged, yet better than I could have asked for!

I literally accepted a job and moved to DC within 3 weeks! It was a whirlwind, but the Lord worked out so many details, and I know that the nation’s capital is where He has called me for the time being!!

Here is a snapshot of some of my dreams!

1) Grow old with my best friend!

Yes, I do want a beautiful wedding day, but I am more excited about marrying my best friend and the love of my life. What a privilege the Lord gives us to grow old with one person and honor Him through a marriage!

My heart does long to have a man that will choose to love me, cherish me, care about me, and represent Christ to me…

The Lord hasn’t placed that person in my life yet, but I am genuinely content with where I am. I know that the Lord’s timing is far better than I can imagine. I am not sitting around “waiting” to be married, I am living my life as a single woman and if the Lord sees fit, I shall be married! Until then, here’s to single hood!

2) Adopt a child!

I take that back…I want to adopt a whole village of children!!

Being adopted myself, I am constantly aware of what an incredible gift adoption is! My life would not be the same if I hadn’t been adopted, and one of my biggest desires is to give the gift of adoption to children in the future!

3) Write a book!

The Lord has specifically called me to write a book for women. The topic that He has asked me to write about is the most intimate part about myself and I am not sure when the right time to share it is. A few years ago, I found out some things that radically changed my life, and were an intense time of suffering in my life. As a result of the things I found out, my life and future changed.

4) Travel the world

I have been blessed to visit some pretty cool places!

Bucharest, Romania

Paris, France

It stole my heart…

Athens and a few islands in Greece

Rome, Italy

Even though I’ve been to some of the world’s most incredible locations, there is a hunger in me to see even more of the world! A few of the other places I’d like to see include:

London, England – I need to visit Princess Kate

Germany

Spain

Revisit Paris – A piece of my heart was left there

Prague

Swiss Alps – Maybe try some skiing?

Amalfi Coast –

Croatia

Ireland

…basically anywhere in Europe

Fiji – I hear the beaches are pretty!

Colorado Mountains

The Grand Canyon

Alaska

Hawaii

Niagara Falls

Prince Edward Island, Canada – Anne of Green Gables

Charleston, South Carolina

New York City

I am already planning my next trip…

5) Live in a house with a red door!

This might seem like a silly dream, but I have always wanted to live in a house with a red door. There is something so welcoming about a red door, and I intend to have a house with an inviting red door!

6) Perfect my French

Je parle un peu de français – I speak a little French

I have taken a few years of French, but I am far from fluent! I would love to be able to speak it well one day!

7) Have lunch with John Piper

Of all the people on this planet I could sit down with for an hour or two, John Piper tops the list! He is one of the men who’s writing and speaking leads me closer to Christ. I have read almost every one of his books, listened to countless sermons and watched videos of him. It would be an honor to meet such a man of God!

Etc…

Those are just a few of my dreams! While I have many others, some great and some small, I close in sharing my biggest goal and dream in life!

My greatest passion and desire is that my life accurately represents Christ to the world!

If I accomplish every one of my other dreams, but fail in this area, I have wasted my life! Oh may this never be!

Beloved, as I’ve shared some of my heart with you, my charge and encouragement to you is this – whatever your dreams are, may you always glorify our Father in heaven first and foremost. I constantly submit my dreams before His throne, because He is my great guide and knows what is best for me and for His glory!

I wasn’t originally planning on writing a blog on the movie, “Magic Mike” for two reasons: 1) I haven’t even seen the movie. 2) I didn’t feel extremely comfortable discussing this movie because of the content. But I felt like I couldn’t keep silent on this subject. It breaks my heart that this is the kind of movies that Hollywood is putting out and we actually pay money for this trash.

For those of you that don’t know what Magic Mike is, here’s an accurate description…

“A male stripper teaches a younger performer how to party, pick up women, and make easy money.”

The movie features Channing Tatum and Matthew McConaughey (both extremely attractive men) but the story follows them and the career of male stripping. Magic Mike was released tonight, but prior to the release girls everywhere were going nuts and making absolute fools of themselves over this movie. I am embarrassed for some of the things I’ve seen on facebook and twitter from girls that claim Christ as their Savior. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not questioning their salvation by any means, but I do want to speak some encouragement into their lives and share my thoughts on this movie.

Ladies,

Please examine your hearts and think before you speak. I encourage you to watch your language when discussing guys. Yes, I know that both of the leads of the movie are good looking, but that doesn’t mean that you get to speak in any manner you wish. We get angry when guys talk degradingly about girls, yet we think it’s okay for us to speak in a manner that doesn’t honor men.

Remember that we are commanded to honor the Lord with our words and our thoughts. I don’t think that watching a man prance around with hardly any clothes on will do much to promote Godly thoughts. (Just something to chew over!)

This movie (and others like it) should NOT be your example of what to look for in a future husband. (Duhhh!!!) It might sound simple to say it, but for many of us, watching movies like this don’t give us a realistic expectation of men. You should be looking for a man who will love one woman for the rest of his life and commit to marrying and spending the rest of his life with that one woman. (One of the God given benefits of a marriage is sex!) You should not be looking for someone who doesn’t respect you enough to commit every part of himself to you!!

I hope that encourages you to stay the course!! Don’t ever settle and wait on the very best that the Lord has to offer you!

When writing on the topic of future mates, I would like to add a very important clarification, before I continue on my list. To make that clarification, I need to be vulnerable with you. In high school, I always assumed that I would go to college, meet someone my sophomore or junior year, date for a couple of years, and get married shortly after graduation. That was my personal plan. But life isn’t working out how I expected it too, I am still happily single, I will graduate college in a year, and have no set in stone plan for after I graduate. But you want to know something…that is completely okay! I had a very bad attitude for a while because i thought that the Lord owed me because I’ve been faithfully following Him, so He should give me what I want right?? Wrong!! Beloved, I want to tell you that if the Lord had given me half the things I have asked for, I would be one spoiled brat! Please trust Him! Trust that He hasn’t forgotten about you, He knows your desires and He plans to fulfill them…just not in the timing you had planned. Keep that in mind as your continue reading!

3. Be the right person

I have touched on this point before in my writing, but I want to hit on it again. Instead of constantly keeping your eyes peeled for the “right” person, focus all that extra time and energy on becoming someone worthy of marriage and an incredible spouse!

Read good books!

Take a class!

Get wisdom from older couples!

Stay in shape!

Mentor a younger guy/girl!

Strengthen your relationship with your parents…siblings…friends…etc

Budget your money!

There is a wealth of things you can be doing right now to prepare yourself so that one day, when you meet a person who you could see yourself getting married to, you won’t have to spend years working on yourself, you’ll be able to present yourself as a strong, well-rounded individual.

4. Control your emotions!

Kind of going off the last point, before you can expect to have a good relationship and one day, a good marriage, you need to learn how to be emotionally stable! This might sound like a joke coming from my mouth, because I’ve gone through some stuff in my days (that’s a whole other story) and I am currently learning how to be an emotionally consistent and independent person. Beloved, you can’t expect someone to always take care of your feelings, that’s not what other people are there for. Learn now how to take your emotions straight to the Lord! It’s okay not to be okay, but you can’t live your life in a constant state of emotional turmoil. Eventually you’re going to have to deal with emotions and control them.

I started a series on relationships and got a lot of feedback on it. This topic seems to be popular with the 20 somethings right now (I fall in this category) because it’s a relevant part of our life. Let me clarify, relationships are always relevant, but in this particular stage of life for my age group, people are starting to get engaged, married, start a family, etc. So I wanted to continue with this series, because it is so applicable to life.

I personally don’t have an extensive dating past, and I’m still unmarried, but I’ve done my fair share of reading and talking to other around me (so I’m kind of an expert…right?!) The subject I want to address today is the subject of your future mate. Statistically speaking, most of you will be married one day, and if you’re currently single (by single here, I mean unmarried, not single in the sense that you aren’t currently dating someone) you should be thinking and praying about your future spouse. Here are some tips I have to offer….

1. Pray

Pray for your future spouse!! I cannot emphasize this point enough! The Lord already knows who you’re going to marry, why wouldn’t you be praying for them now? I pray often for my future husband, even though I have no idea who he is right now, I pray for his…

Walk with the Lord – I pray that God strengthens and grows him in Himself, and that he’ll treasure the Lord above all else.

Courage – I pray that he is a man of deep courage and is exercising it currently in his life with the people he knows.

Purity – I pray that the Lord keeps him pure in his thoughts and actions. I realize people make mistakes, but I pray that the Lord will restore what is lost if need be, and continue to help him on the road of purity.

Leadership – I pray that he continues to grow into the kind of man that will one day lead me and my family, both spiritually, but also financially, emotionally, practically, etc.

Wisdom – I pray that the Lord gives him wisdom and discernment in all areas of his life, and that he is able to make decisions that honor the Lord and the people in his life.

While that is not an exhaustive list, I hope it helps you to see how I pray for my future spouse. Granted, this is not an every day occurrence, because I feel like emotionally, I would be placing myself in a position that I don’t need to be in right now. But I do pray for “him” from time to time, and I think it’s beneficial to lay these things before the Lord.

2. Know what you want!

This point definitely needs some clarification before I further explain it. When I say to “know what you want” I mean that you should have a list of qualities that you absolutely will not compromise on. These are character issues, not physical ones. For instance, while I might say, “I want someone that’s tall, dark, and handsome, plays guitar and has blue eyes.” Those are outward things, and aren’t things that would change whether or not I would marry someone. Yes, it would be nice to have someone physically attractive, but if I ended up with the world’s most gorgeous man, who also happened to have no character, life would not be much fun, because he would not have good character. The things I am talking about are issues of the heart and his/her character. Make up a short list of the qualities/characteristics that you will not settle and stick to it!! When a Ryan Gosling look-alike swoops in and takes you on the most romantic date ever, but then turns out to be a scumbag, run run run as fast as you can in the other direction! Here are my qualities that I won’t settle on…

Christian– His genuine adoration for the Father must be evident in his everyday life, in how he talks, in how he treats people, in how he spends his money, in how he spends his time, etc. Nominal Christianity isn’t good enough for me!

Leadership –If I’m going to get married one day, I will be marrying a MAN, not a boy, and I absolutely refuse to marry someone who can’t stand up for themselves or for me! They must be able to exercise their leadership and know how to effectively lead with strength and dignity.

Family – I grew up in a large family, and we are all very close. Since family is so important, I desire that for my future, and if I am going to get married, then family must be a priority for both of us.

Like I said, try to keep this list relatively short! I used to have a really long list, but realized that most of the things on the list were personal preference and not things that were truly important. (While having someone buy me flowers on a regular basis would be very nice, I decided I should probably erase that one from my list!)